possible shell problem

[Scott McDaniel]

Scott McDaniel

July 9, 2007 at 2:56 pm #25085

I had made a few posts earlier and the general consensus was to just try a few other options to get my female sub-adult to bask more frequently to help with her few old small scutes that never came off. While I did catch her basking and have been trying to dry dock her for a bit each night, I’m getting a bit impatient because I don’t want anything to harm her. I noticed a slight white discoloration around one of the old scutes and some of the spaces under the old scutes when lift the flap looks like it may be trapping some slight amounts of debris. This really worries me and I don’t want her to get shell rot. The shell area is not soft but I read on Jonathan’s site that in the case of shell rot to use a toothpick to scrap off the area and loose scutes, then apply betadine and dry dock the terp for about 24 hours. Is this something I should do at this point? I will leave it alone if I’m not supposed to mess with these scutes but I feel like something should be done. Her water is clean but it is fresh water and I would like to avoid changing over to brackish if I can but I will of course do whatever it takes to ensure her health. She is captive born and has never had any salinity in her water. She is starting to shed some of her skin again so she may be close to shedding another set of scutes soon, which I’m guessing usually coincides. Everything else is fine and the rest of her shell is very healthy so I feel if I do something now everything will be alright. What should I do? Thank you all for your time. -Scott

[Author]

Posts